


Sleepless in King Falls

by tealeafling



Category: King Falls AM (Podcast)
Genre: Ben Arnold Is A Mess, Fluff, Gen, Sammy is a dad friend, hints of Ben Arnold/Emily Potter, it’s mostly fluff with little hints of angst I guess?, mentions of Chet Sebastian, pre-Episode 75, probably slight canon divergence at the end
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-29
Updated: 2018-04-29
Packaged: 2019-04-29 15:53:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 797
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14476068
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tealeafling/pseuds/tealeafling
Summary: Ben’s work on his notebook—sorry, thought journal—has been running him into the ground. Sammy helps.





	Sleepless in King Falls

**Author's Note:**

> Hey all! This is my first King Falls fic and only my second one ever that I’ve posted, so any comments or constructive criticism are welcome! Hope you enjoy!

“Well, thank you Doyle, for that... less than informative call. Alright, dear listeners, we’re gonna take a quick pause for the cause. We’ll be right back to field more of your calls after this break.”

Ben hung up the line with Doyle Bevins and popped in a tape, taking off his headphones just as he heard the beginning of Archie’s pom-chi palace jingle.

Across the desk, Sammy removed his headphones as well, standing up. “I’m gonna head to the bathroom real quick.”

Ben nodded, yawning. “Yeah, sure, dude. Try to be back by the end of the commercial.” He reached in front of him for his mug of coffee.

“Isn’t that your seventh mug in the last few hours?” His co-host shook his head, giving him a strange look before walking out of the studio. “Ben, you’re becoming some kind of caffeine fiend.”

He leaned back in his chair, towards the doorway Sammy had just exited through. “I prefer the term _focused!”_

But if he was being honest with himself, his focus really was slipping.

Ben only had a few more days until Sammy’s contract ended and he left King Falls. As of yet, he hadn’t managed to come up with any plan to convince him to stay. He’d been spending basically every hour outside of the studio trying to find a way to keep Sammy from leaving it, which meant there was no time for sleeping.

The only times he had slept within the past week or so was when he fell asleep on top of his thought journal. He was running on pure coffee at this point, although he could have sworn he was developing some kind of resistance to it, since even after seven cups of coffee he was still bone-tired.

He huffed out a small laugh. _Sounds like the lamest, most inconvenient superpower ever. Resistance to caffeine._

And as soon as that thought left his mind, he passed out.

***

When Sammy returned to the recording studio, the commercial had ended, but the air was dead.

“Ben, what are you—“

 _Oh._ He was asleep on his desk, hand still wrapped around his coffee.

The past few weeks, Ben had seemed to be either as hopped up as a five year old on Five Hour Energy, or about one yawn away from becoming Rip Van Winkle. This was a Rip Van Winkle kind of night, apparently.

Sammy tried to ignore the little twinge of guilt that came from knowing Ben was running himself into the ground for him.

He quietly moved around to his microphone. “Sorry for the dead air, folks. We have a bit of an issue over here at the station, so we’re just gonna pop in a best-of tape and—“

The hotline rang. Sammy ran over to pick it up before the shrill noise could wake his slumbering co-host.

“Sammy, is everything alright up there?”

 _Emily._ “Thanks for your concern, Emily,” he whispered. “Everything’s fine here, just, uh—“ He glanced over at Ben, making sure none of the noise had woken him. “Just, Ben fell asleep.” It sounded a bit silly when he said it out loud. Stopping the whole show, not even halfway through their time slot, just because one of the hosts couldn’t stay awake?

But Emily just sighed, her relief evident. “Oh, thank God. I’ve been getting worried about him. You make sure he gets some rest, alright, Sammy?”

He chuckled quietly. “Don’t worry, Emily, I’ll make sure he does. I’m gonna let you go now, and we’ll end the show here. Thanks for tuning in, King Falls, and we’ll see you tomorrow.”

After setting everything up to finish out the rest of the night, Sammy took off his jacket and laid it over Ben’s back. _No way I’m using one of the blankets from Chet’s office. This’ll have to do._

He checked his watch. There was still about three hours left before they had to clear out for the next show.

_Which is honestly probably more sleep than Ben’s gotten in a while, huh?_

He gave a small, sad smile. This kid cared so much about him.

Sammy sighed. _Dammit... what am I doing?_ Lily was right when she said there was nothing for him outside King Falls. Either Jack was here, or he was gone entirely. And Ben was trying so hard to help him, to help Jack. Maybe if he stayed, they really could save him...

He felt around on the bottom of his desk, pulling out the contract that Ben had put there almost two weeks before. _I guess the fact that I didn’t get rid of this really says something, doesn’t it?_

Sammy grabbed a pen and signed the contract, then leaned back in his chair, closed his eyes, and drifted off to sleep.

**Author's Note:**

> ...as I said, this is the second one I’ve _posted..._ I’ve written a few KFAM things that I trashed bc they just weren’t very good. From doing that I’ve realized that I’m _definitely_ better at writing Ben than Sammy, and this is more Sammy than Ben, so if anything seems at all OOC or anything, your comments are welcome!


End file.
